In 2009 I decided to try and do the thing I always wanted to do: become a writer. This blog tracks the journey. I'm now a Content Editor at Matter & Co, writing every day, mostly for Pioneers Post.

Friday, 27 January 2012

Motivation

I'm making one of these for myself this weekend.

The subject writers most commonly write about is probably procrastination. There are a million reasons not to write. Some of mine currently are; the 40 hour a week job that I need to pay for the wedding, the wedding (organising invites, sorting hotels for the family, blah, blah), not spending so much time in front of the laptop and more with my partner...it goes on.

I often ask my partner 'What's the difference between a reason and an excuse?' (this pops up a lot when we argue, funnily enough). No one would say, I'm guessing, that I shouldn't spend more quality time with her rather than watching the telly or fannying about on Twitter. The point is, my only real reason to write is in the hope of freedom. I spend so much time in front of the laptop now in the hope that, in the future, all that time invested will have left me with a life where I can write a few hours a day and then have all the rest of the day to do what the hell I like. All too often though, I forget that and occasionally I need to be reminded. It's at times like these that I need a kick up the arse.

My wife to be is good at this. God knows I don't like hearing it (I feel ashamed, like when I used to get told off by the teachers at school). We're getting married, we live in a one bedroom flat that is struggling to contain all our shit and we're both hitting 40 this year. I need to be a provider, both for her and, should we be lucky enough at our age, for a child that comes along. And that child will need to be inspired by the choices that I made - it won't want a father that too regularly comes home frustrated and embittered because he was too scared to try and get the things that he wanted. Scared to fail mostly. A worry that, in the light of a short existence of 80 years give or take, seems ridiculous.

As a footnote on failure, I would also like to say thanks to an old friend who spotted that I had failed to keep to the resolution in my last post. Like I said, sometimes I need the kick up the arse. Thanks Sam.

2 comments:

That's a great motivation! I think freedom and the desire to be authentic and get the things I want out of life are a big part of it for me too. And, like you, I avoid writing plenty of times, and struggle to remember exactly what I'm doing or why I'm doing it. Luckily my wife is also good at kicking :-) She does it because she loves me, of course, and wants me to realise my dreams. But I think she also enjoys it...

About Me

I'm now a Content Editor at Matter&Co, where amongst other things, I write a lot for Pioneers Post. As a freelance writer, I got commissions from the Sunday Times Travel Magazine, Mail Online, Marie Claire, Metro, The Telegraph and Square Mile (to name a few). I still do the odd bit of freelance writing but rarely have the time.

I like writing positive stories and as well as the many people I write about on Pioneers Post whose work has meaning and does good, I'm interested in the kind of achievers that appear in Pass Me On, a daisy chain of interviews exploring six degrees of separation.

The majority of my freelance writing covered culture, travel and reviewing restaurants. A selection of clippings can be read here. I spent six years trying to make writing be my main source of income. The highs and lows are all documented at Can I Write for a Living?